The Images of Research (IoR) exhibition, run by the University of Northampton Graduate School, will open in the Avenue Gallery corridor on January 31st 2018 from 5pm and will stay there until February 23rd. After this it will travel to Park Campus, to be displayed on the ground floor of Rockingham Library then at Avenue Library […]

Blog Archives

The proportion of UK research which is available via open access is increasing at a considerable rate, with 37% of research outputs freely available to the world immediately at publication.

​​This report, the second in a series commissioned by the Universities UK Open Access Coordination Group, aims to build on previous findings, and to examine trends over the period since the major funders of research in the UK established new policies to promote open access.​

The research was delivered by a partnership involving Research Consulting, the University of Sheffield and Elsevier, and was led by Jubb Consulting​.

Emerald Publishing have updated their open access policy, and now allow all accepted manuscripts to be made freely available through your institutional repository (NECTAR), without any embargo period. This applies to articles that have been previously published, and those which are yet to be published.

The Research Support Team will be identifying as many of our Emerald Publications as possible that currently have embargo periods set, and removing these. If we have missed your publication, please email Nectar@northampton.ac.uk and we will make the necessary changes as soon as possible.

Authors of articles published in Wiley journals are encouraged to share their research data including, but not limited to: raw data, processed data, software, algorithms, protocols, methods, materials.

The majority of Wiley’s journals enforce one of the following standardized data sharing policies:

Encourages Data Sharing
Expects Data Sharing
Mandates Data Sharing

An excel spreadsheet of all Wiley’s journals and their associated policy on data sharing can be found under the pinned items in the Yammer Research Support Group.

If you use Research Gate – Please ensure that you have uploaded the accepted manuscript to NECTAR… STM (International Association of Scientific Technical and Medical Publishers) are taking on Research Gate with regards to copyright infringment…

By all means use Research Gate – but rather than uploading the full text, please provide a link to your article that’s in NECTAR.

What is made public through NECTAR has had the copyright checked by professional staff, and the University is also covered by a takedown notice. We cannot cover you for your use of Research Gate.

You have spent many long hours pouring over your research, verifying your findings, finding the best journal to submit to (before submitting do check on Think Check Submit to ensure you are publishing in a trusted journal), your article is accepted for publication… before the celebrations begin… take a few minutes to ensure that you article does not become ineligible for submission in the next REF.

Ensure that you upload the accepted manuscript to NECTAR (Institutional Repository) as soon as your article is accepted… Well.. Okay.. Maybe the day after, when the celebrations are over… But before you start work on your next output… And within a month of acceptance. This gives our staff time to check through the output and metadata and make any changes necessary, whilst also ensuring that your research output will not fail to be submitted to the REF due to failing to comply with an administrative process.

Please take a moment to check out our five simple steps, that will ensure that your outputs remain eligible for submission in the next REF.

The problem

Hundreds of new open access journals are being set up by reputable publishers, scholarly societies and universities each year. Unfortunately, alongside these reputable journals, an increasing number of pay-to-publish “vanity” journals continue to appear. Such journals are referred to as ‘predatory’ or ‘bogus’ journals. Some academic authors are being scammed into submitting their research outputs to be published in these journals that do not have proper quality control or peer review processes.

The risks

No proper peer review is carried out to preserve the quality of the research output.

Damage to the reputation of the researcher and institution.

Researchers and institutions lend their reputation to a disreputable publication.

Negative impact on the REF submission if the publication is not detected.

Your article will most likely not be able to be published elsewhere.

Copyright would likely be retained by the publisher.

How to check for predatory journals?

Think Check Submit – Provides a checklist of questions that can be used to identify trusted journals.

Look out for the following warning signs:

Board of Editors list shows that members are not recognised in their field or that they are affiliated with questionable institutions; however, this should be done with caution, as Board member names may be used without their permission.

Journals with dubious or non-existent addresses for their registered office.

Unsolicited email or paper communication inviting publication in journals you don’t know or have never heard of.

Unsolicited invitations to conferences run by event managers, not professionals in the research area, often at attractive destinations.

Note – Legitimate new journals acknowledge if they are newly created and do not yet have an impact factor.

Further steps to undertake:

Consult the Directory of Open Access Journals for reputable journals (doaj.org)

Resist the temptation to publish quickly and easily in any journal. Be aware of the publication landscape in your research area and the most reputable journals (check with your research leader if unsure).

Jeffrey Beall (librarian at the University of Colorado Denver) has also created lists of ‘Potential, possible or predatory’ scholarly open access journals and publishers. This list is controversial and has been debated, however it has been listed on many university webpages.

FAQ: Does the University have any funds available to pay publishers’ article processing charges (APCs) and if so, how can I apply for these?

As of August 1st 2016 the University of Northampton has set aside an Open Access (OA) fund to support the payment of article processing charges (APCs).

APCs are the charges levied by publishers to cover the cost of making an individual article OA at the point of publication (aka ‘gold’ OA). This may be in a fully OA journal or in a ‘hybrid’ journal which makes otherwise subscription only articles available OA on payment of an APC.

Last week I attended an interesting event put on by Taylor and Francis (T&F) and, knowing that quite a few Northampton researchers publish with T&F, I thought I’d share some of the things I learned.

There were several talks during the day, covering support for early career researchers; peer review and journal development; the role of the editorial team; journal production; dissemination; and open access. The full slide presentation is available here but for me a number of points stood out.

“The internet is awash with bloggers and dedicated sites giving advice to early-career scientists and graduate research students (what I’ll collectively refer to as ECRs). Much of it is very good (see for example The Thesis Whisperer, any number of posts over at Dynamic Ecology and Small Pond Science, and the University of Northampton’s own Research Support Hub), though sometimes it’s contradictory and comes down to matters of taste and opinion …

… But there is very little guidance and advice out there for more senior scientists who are mid- to late-career.”